Men’s Basketball: Terriers Try for Four Straight Wins, Visit Colgate

By: Matt Doherty

After a thrilling 87-84 overtime victory against Loyola Maryland on Martin Luther King Day, the BU Men’s Basketball team will have no time to savor their comeback heroics as they head right back to work on Wednesday night when they travel to upstate New York to take on Colgate University.

Eric Fanning led all scorers with a career high 37 points in the win over Loyola on Monday night as the Terriers picked up their third consecutive Patriot League win after starting conference play with three straight losses. BU currently sits at 10-9 (3-3 PL) and will look for win number four against a surprising Colgate squad.

The Red Raiders struggled in non-conference play to a tune of a 4-7 record but have played well since the schedule has switched to Patriot League play. Colgate was predicted to finish second to last in the preseason poll but have exceeded expectations sitting in sole possession of third place at 4-2.

Fifth year head coach Matt Langel has improved win totals in each of his first four seasons in Hamilton and holds wins over Lafayette, American, Army, and Bucknell in the league so far this season.

Senior Austin Tillotson leads the team in scoring at 13.1 PPG with sophomore forward Jordan Swopshire behind him at 10.1 PPG. The rest of the scoring is spread out with five players averaging over 6.2 PPG.

Colgate has prided itself on defense this season giving up only 70.4 PPG which puts them third in the league in that category. The Red Raiders will have a daunting task of slowing down the high-powered BU offense who scored 87 points just two days ago.

With Eric Fanning playing as well as he has ever played coupled with the return of starting guard Cheddi Mosely the Terriers are clicking on all offensive cylinders as of late.

Joe Jones has viable scoring options every single night but the emphasis of late has been defense. After holding American and Lafayette to 50 and 47 points respectively, BU allowed 84 last time out to Loyola. A lot of that had to due with foul trouble from defensive anchor Nathan Dieudonne and forward Nick Havener.

On Wednesday, BU will need to stay out of foul trouble and return to the dominant defense they displayed in the first two contests of this three game winning streak.

Tip off from Cotterell Court is set for 7 p.m. and can be seen live on the Patriot League Network.